Elena Rybakina acknowledges her 2025 season hasn't been up to her standard so far but refuses to declare it "bad."
As you probably know, the Kazakh's year started in a very turbulent way as Goran Ivanisevic left her team shortly after she returned Stefano Vukov to her coaching staff. However, that wasn't the end of the drama as the WTA banned Vukov from coaching for a year.
Since then, Rybakina has posted a 37-14 record and it is not a secret that she has struggled with consistency throughout the year. While the 26-year-old won the WTA 500 tournament in Strasbourg in May, she has also had several stunning defeats - like blowing four consecutive match points against Aryna Sabalenka in a Stuttgart third-set tie-break, or most recently losing to Leylah Fernandez in the Washington semifinal from 7-6 (2) 5-3 up.
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Rybakina's Grand Slam year has also been subpar - she only made the round-of-16 at the Australian Open and the French Open, while she exited Wimbledon in the third round. Also, in the spring, she exited the top-10 for the first time in two years and she is now ranked at No. 12.
Currently, the Kazakh is competing at the WTA 1000 tournament in Montreal, where she has been through to the semifinal.
Rybakina asked how she would describe her season
"Well, the season overall is not bad. Of course, I had more success in the previous years, and it was a bit tough for me at the beginning of the year. I feel like I used to play much better in the first part of the year usually, but it took me some time to get back to level I want to be. I think that now I'm happy how the things are going, and hopefully I can change a little bit what was happening in the past years and play even better in the second part of the year," the current world No. 12 said.
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If Rybakina beats Victoria Mboko in the semifinal, she will make her biggest final of the year.
